[SOLVED] Help for total beginner WiFi setup

Just installed Volumio to a USB flash drive. So far everything seems to work fine except I can’t get it to connect to the internet. I have wireless internet where I live and the Dell laptop the USB drive is on is connected. I notice on the list of things that come up when I’m booting into Volumio that what I think is the firmware for my wireless adapter is not found. The adapter is B43 something. I’ve gotten it to work with different versions of Linux so I wonder is there some way to get it working with Volumio. Can I install the files for my wireless adapter onto the USB flash drive some how? Hope you can help. Thanks

Yes, same procedure than with your other linux setup most likely.
You just need to log to Volumio console (function keys) or ssh to it from another machine and install your driver/firmware through command-line as usual.

Can you tell me how to log to a Volumio console? I think if I can get a terminal in Volumio while it’s running I can install the firmware for my wireless card. Thanks.

Alt-Fn or Ctrl-Alt-Fn (try a few Fonction keys, might be F1, F3, etc).
Then user:pass are volumio:volumio

Well I tried and tried but cannot get Volumio to work with my laptop’s wifi. Maybe they’re not compatible. I ordered a little USB wifi adapter that is listed here as working with Volumio so we’ll see how that goes.

Thought I would add I was looking for drivers again for my wireless card and found this. From a terminal I entered lspci -vnn -d 14e4: The results are below.

0c:00.0 Network controller [0280]: Broadcom Corporation BCM4312 802.11b/g LP-PHY [14e4:4315] (rev 01)
Subsystem: Dell Wireless 1395 WLAN Mini-Card [1028:000b]
Flags: bus master, fast devsel, latency 0, IRQ 17
Memory at fe8fc000 (64-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=16K]
Capabilities:
Kernel driver in use: b43-pci-bridge

Yes BCM drivers can be quite complex to install sometimes: there are many options available: look at this.
First check dmesg to see if your problem is just missing firmware.

If it’s not sufficient, you may have to build driver from sources or dkms (so need to install dev tools and relevant kernel headers): this might help.
Good luck!..

I have downloaded drivers, etc. and install instructions that have worked with two or three other Linux distributions but so far no luck with Volumio. If Volumio is close to Debian that might be a problem. I never could get Debian to work with my Laptop’s WiFi. It’s a good feeling though when you solve a problem and get something working. :slight_smile:

Volumio is definitely Debian-based

Well, just had to post and say I got WiFi working for Volumio installed on a USB flash drive, plugged into my Dell laptop. Using the Broadcom b43 drivers. The 32 bit. Transfered the files into the Volumio home directory, booted into Volumio, brought up the command line and followed instructions I had used for my other Linux distros. Rebooted and low and behold! I’m posting this while booted into Volumio. So I’m at least online. Now to see if I can get some music from the net. If anybody’s interested will post after I do some experimenting. Thanks to all that replied to my original post.

Sure, this may help others.
Then you can also list your machine in the x86 compatibility thread, and reference the method for onboard wifi driver from here.

OK, how I got Volumio to work with my Dell Latitude D530 laptop wireless card. I have Volumio installed on a USB flash drive and working. First here is information on my wireless.

From a terminal I entered lspci -vnn -d 14e4: The results are below.

0c:00.0 Network controller [0280]: Broadcom Corporation BCM4312 802.11b/g LP-PHY [14e4:4315] (rev 01)
Subsystem: Dell Wireless 1395 WLAN Mini-Card [1028:000b]
Flags: bus master, fast devsel, latency 0, IRQ 17
Memory at fe8fc000 (64-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=16K]
Capabilities:
Kernel driver in use: b43-pci-bridge

The two files I downloaded are b43-fwcutter_018-2_i386.deb and broadcom-wl-5.100.138.tar.bz2. Put them in a folder named offline_firmware-b43-installer. From that Linux distro put that folder into /volumio_data/dyn/home in Volumio on the flash drive. Then booted into Volumio and brought up a command line. Then the following.

cd into offline_firmware-b43-installer
sudo dpkg -i b43-fwcutter_018-2_i386.deb
tar xvjf broadcom-wl-5.100.138.tar.bz2
cd offline_firmware-b43-installer/broadcom-wl-5.100.138/linux
sudo b43-fwcutter -w /lib/firmware wl_apsta.o
sudo chmod 755 /lib/firmware/b43

Reboot Volumio. Volumio should start wireless internet. I went into Network on the Volumio menu and there was a list of available networks. Chose mine and entered my password. That’s how it went for me any way. :slight_smile: I’m not an expert on this, obviously, so I hope my instructions make sense.

I hope this helps if anyone else is having the same trouble. I’ve used this same process to get my laptop wireless card working with Linux Mint, Lubuntu and others.